


The Black Oval

by klancingthecube (hazyamethyst)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender, klance - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, Soulmate AU, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Why Though, and it Does Things To Lance, bless that woman, haggar and zarkon are pretty absent but they arent bad, keith did Something™, keith is very gay, s/o to lance's mom too she LOVES her son so much okay, she's patient and understanding and just wants her boy to be safe and happy, that's a good question, they are teens in this, they have unique soulmarks that change depending on your partner's mood/experiences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-04
Updated: 2017-11-09
Packaged: 2018-12-24 01:08:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12001767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hazyamethyst/pseuds/klancingthecube
Summary: Sundays.It's simple: Lance loved Sundays. Well, not exactly. He loved that he got to spend the entire day with his family doing nothing at all. He loved being outdoors for hours on end, too, and having the freedom to be silly and childish to his heart's content. It wasn't like there was any high-school kid around to tell on him. There was always time to be cool, later on.He always figured his soulmate would appreciate the light, sincere feelings.





	1. Chapter 1

It’s sunny and breezy outside, tranquil tainted not with of the hullabaloo children make but the echoes of it, faint, most, in a way only houses in the middle of nowhere can allow. There’s the smell of freshly cut grass- by him, yes, thank you- and there’s dresses, younger siblings and cousins and their friends pulling him in and out football matches as much as wedding rehearsals that cared little for conventions, or so he thought, as little girls rushed to find flowers, chairs, rocks or, if they were the lucky ones, squirrels…for grooms. He’s marrying these exotic couples for a solid hour before everyone is in a happy just-married bliss and he could re-join his now losing football team, with his brooding brother, Leo, as a captain. But there’s trouble in paradise soon, and divorces need to be issued, tears swept off, rubbing alcohol dabbed where lousy husbands scratched plump skin before scurrying away. Lance is booed on his way out the pitch, hauled one or five water bottles then, of course, quickly sought during the halftime.

It’s well into dusk when he’s finally left on his own. Lying on the cooling ground, he closes his eyes and tries not to think of all the homework he didn’t do, or how his room is an utter mess left right and centre, and…his face. It’s dry and a bit scaly from the sun, he just _knows_ , but a quick Epsom salt bath would have to do. He’s too tired to go through any nighttime beauty ritual, which is okay. He’s happy tired. He loves being able to spend time with his family like this, lazy Sundays just goofing around after wolfing down the best lasagna in the world, done by the best cook in the world… _Mama._

Smiling, he sits up and eyes a little bouquet of lily of the valley flowers held together with a pink ribbon, probably dropped by some careless tiny maid or other. He stretches an arm to pick it up but it jerks before he’s able to. It’s a dull pinch first, but it the pain skyrockets fast and it spreads, up, up, up and it’s piercing, he can’t process much other than it _hurts_ and he’s fallen back somewhere it’s black, a solid, cold, black he tries to blink away and maybe he cries, maybe he shudders but it doesn’t make it stop. It doesn’t make it better.  
  
He feels sucked into nothing, he’s nothing, there’s nothing. It’s empty all around.

Until his mama comes to take him inside, that is. 

 

X

“Where are they?! What happened?!”

Lance gasps, his own voice sounding foreign to him- the words, too. He’s just relieved it’s stopped, whatever it was. His mama is sat by his side on the bed, and it’s warm, busy with the background noises of people eating, talking and arguing all at once.

“Mom? I’m- _jeez_ , I feel like… heavy?! You don’t think Lucia put something in my chocolate, do you? Again! Talk about cheek!” He aims for a crackle, but it falls short. The burden in his chest seems to bloom at the failed gesture.

“ _Hijo_. Lance, my baby. Oh, my sweet boy, I’m so sorry.” She shakes her head and leans forward a fraction. The undiluted blue eyes she loves so dearly look as lively as ever, and it tugs at her heartstrings. “I’m so, so sorry. Nobody deserves this, no, of course not, but…you’re strong, yes?  You have to be strong for mama and all of us, okay? We’ll never leave you, my boy.” She closes her hands on his, tight to the point Lance can feel her quickened pulse. “A lot of people are suffering, and struggling. There’s a lot of pain in the world…just as there’s beauty. And love to give! It’s going to be all right. Tough? Absolutely, but…But you have to! Oh Lance, _prométeme hijo, por favor_. Promise me!”

And with a loud kiss to his knuckles she lets him go. His hand, free, settles itself dumbly on his lap, palm up, fingers still bent and, below, on his wrist, a bruise. Or rather, a stain. It’s a black oval of sorts and very first silly instinct is to try to wipe it off. Fingers dig into cold skin and rub tentatively. Spit joins soon enough, then force. Scratching. Panic is well-settled in the pit of his stomach before his mother stops him and her little speech starts to truly sink in.

“Where’s the rose? Where’s the beautiful red rose with the thorns that sometimes fall off and the petals that sometimes flap back as if blown by the wind? Where’s…where’s my soulmark?! It was there just this morning, I saw it!”” Lance flings off his t-shirt and starts scanning his skin with fingertips cold enough to raise a goosebump trail as they move around limbs. “I know it may droop, get tinier or bigger…but black? No, it doesn’t make sense, I know they may get sad, or angry. Mom, I know! I feel them…I felt them so clearly, always. Good and bad, mama! It can’t just vanish! What did they do?!”

“Shh, that’s nothing for you to worry about, my boy. Whatever happened, Lance, it has _nothing_ to do with you. You never met.” She pulls the sheets back up to stop Lance from searching his bare legs any further. He shoots her a deeply anxious look, eyes all big and teary, and it succeeds in shattering what little portion of her heart was still whole. “Yes?”

“No! I promised myself I’d make it better for them. I was…I _am_ actively trying to be funny and positive and sharing good feelings through our bond. They wouldn’t just leave me. They…they’ve been scared a lot, lately. Like, we’re talking pure _dread,_ but…they’re so strong, mom! I …I don’t know how to explain it. She might be the toughest girl ever, tougher than you! Or a reeeeally badass boy if it’s a he. Or both, if- if- People like that don’t just _die_! Soulmates can’t be forgotten we… _we_ _have_ _a bond_. For life! ”

 _A life that might be over on their end._ His inner voice provides. _There’s no other end. No soulmate to gush over, sing to, or talk about to Hunk and Pidge. You. They left you._

“ No, no, no. Forever! I was born with it.” Lance flails his arms up and gets out of bed with stomping feet. “You can’t take it away from me, nothing can! Nobody! I’ll prove it, they’re not gone.” He points at his mama, the pitying look she giving him infuriating him inside out. “I love them so much. I won’t let it happen, you hear me? Mark my words! I won’t! ”

He slams his bedroom door shut and heads down to the bathroom across from Anita’s room. It’s little, yes, but closer to his room and, as usual, full of residue steam from his sister’s hour-long showers. He attempts to clear his head by picking up pink towels off the floor and putting them back on the rack but it’s not long before he’s breaking down, the so rare privacy and quiet stirring his volatile emotions just the right way. Bending over the basin he splashes his face with warm water until the tears are no longer weighty drops that make a clean fall but flow down in streams that help pour out emotions too dark and sudden to be processed, accepted and dealt with. He stares at the mirror next, only half in trance this time as he parrots the speech he’s always polishing. It doesn’t come as easy, the picturing comes out blurry but they’re there. They are there right in front of him, hesitating to introduce themselves once Lance shuts up because they’ve been swept off their feet, yes. There are no explanations for the black, because they’re not needed, it’s in the past, a mere bad dream as Lance hugs them and they speak at last, no- they laugh, and break free from his hold to hold one of his hands up and intertwine their fingers.

It’s what they say that fades, even when they pull him along, he can’t make it out. Not with the corners going white and warbled whispers barging rudely into the scene to spoil it. To reach out and snatch a part of him. Faraway as it might be, perhaps. But that person he needed as much as blood did veins, and vice versa. The affection for them he’s been long nurturing wouldn’t float up in a nebula and dissolve quietly without taking him down first. Soulmates are not just whimsically attached, they are part of something bigger, a whole he feels strikingly real when he clings on to the hand lying lazy in his grip and for a brief second the colours stop blending together and the mystical realm is barely hold together _._

_It just…us._

He blinks in awe, and then presses his hand into theirs in urgency.  
  
“I’ll find you. I’ll find you and it’ll be better.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“All this.” Lance feels the hand slipping away as he freezes. “We’ll make it better.“  
  
“Please, yes.” They take a step back, and turn to look over their shoulder.  
  
When Lance is faced again, it’s by a boy with a bruised face and swollen red eyes.  “I’ll hold you to that.”  
  
Black, like his hair. Most of his dark locks are blown back by the gust of cold wind that sets off the blending of colours again, so that Lance’s hiding spot rosy representation is reduced to blotches, the rusty bench, brown; the lake it overlooks, blue; the tilted trees, green; and this boy, the focal point from which black expands and takes over, helplessly enveloping Lance head to toe.  
  
Black.

It retreats only when his mama holds him up softly, a hand on his nape, the other on his lower back. There’s coldness tickling from his chin until his head is arranged on a pillow that lies on her lap. He registers some of his siblings murmuring outside the bathroom, sneakers screeching up and down the stairs in a hurry as they come and go.  
  
Hadn’t he locked himself in here?

“My boy, you passed out. And have a nosebleed, just like when you were five or six, remember? Ah, I’m having a déjà vu, Lance.” She cards long fingers easily through his son’s trademark softer-than-silk hair while humming some slow ballad. Her free hand goes to grab a damp towel hanging lonely on the rack, and she dabs it on his chin, mouth and nose, erasing any trace of dried blood she found.  
Lance barely makes sense of her words and instead basks in the care and attention he receives. He feels so weak, especially after seeing it… _him._  
  
Afraid to check his wrist, he shuts his eyes and tries to seek some modicum of peace in himself. On the odd chance that boy _is_ his soulmate, and he’s alive, if not exactly _well_ , Lance needs to get a hold of his emotions. The questions bubbling up in his mind, though, make it quite the challenge.

Could the bruise-like mark mean his soulmate was badly beaten up? Or stand for that tangled mess he had for hair? _Was he in danger?_ Wasn’t it possible they have shared an intimate connection somehow? Or was it just his brain playing tricks on him? What could Lance do, anyhow?  
  
Suppose it isn’t a trick. After all, he can’t say he recalls ever seeing anyone similar. Hell, now that he thinks about it, he’s not sure he’s ever had a crush on a guy!  
So, much to his father’s chagrin, his soulmate may be a _boy_. Just like him. But, also not. He had pretty purplish eyes, sneaky hands and a lot of hair…a mullet, even? He had to be around his age, but was some inches shorter. That's a start.  
  
And yet, it's a lot. For years it had been just dreams of shadows and flashes, and walking up to a cold sweat. But… _this_? This might be the closest he’s got to be to his soulmate for a very long while- knowingly, that is. It shouldn’t come as a surprise he already feels the image of him burned in his memory, along with a thriving longing. Feeling something from him, anything, any tidbit of emotion would do.  
  
An illusion wouldn’t just trigger that.  
  
No, this was something else entirely.

“Mom, it’s so cold without him. I never figured, you know." Lance’s teeth chatter and his mother rubs his cheek placatingly, worried beyond reason about the altered body chemistry of his fifteen-year-old son. "I never did."  
    
Getting hallucinations meant the outlook was dire. Hardly anything can ever come first than the call of your soulmate, and Lance was nothing if not stubborn and passionate.

Which would be good, Irma admits, until there's no real person calling anymore but the bond, broken, trying to even out the imbalance by having the surviving party ‘join’ their soulmates by jumping off a bridge or walking into a train.  
  
“A lot of people pass away every day and you go on with your life, yes? There’s nothing to prove, let or find. You listen to mama, okay?”

“B-but, mom!” Lance blinks his eyes open, taking a deep breath to hold back the tears. “I’ll find him. I promised I would.”

  
“You just listen to mama.”

 

  
  
X


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a few quick things to consider, my dudes:  
> *TW suicide mentions (it's really taunting only but just in case!)  
> *mention of blood/bleeding (it's 0% graphic, and briefer than this warning but, again, just to be on the safe side!)  
> *purple cars should be A Thing™  
>  
> 
> .

The grass isn’t greener on the other side. It slowly dawns on him, it’s damp and prickly. Keith loses his balance after a baseball bat is swung at him and he tries to dodge it last second, only to trip on a rock and fall on what feels like a mat of tiny spikes grazing his skin teasingly.  
  
“Up and about already, orphan kid?” Arlo blows his red hair out of his face and looks down on the boy. He’s frowning and kicking at the rock with might. Sadly he himself had fixed there with Pa last night, and it doesn’t budge an inch. “Don’t look so in pain now. Sure you had your fun, loser. _Oooh,_ wait! What’s that you’re hiding behind your back? ”

Keith hisses in reply and scrambles to stand on his good foot, but Arlo is tall, almost too tall for a kid only a year older than him. And he does _rugby_ , too, a sport he’d never before heard about but some dinnertime tv-watching suggests it revolves around buff guys tackling other buffer guys to steal a ball. It’s kind of hot, in theory…until it’s Arlo pulling at the hem of his jacket and snatching his sketchbook before hitting him with the bat right in the back of his knee, and he yelps, he really can’t help it, can’t muster the strength to scurry away from the muddy boot that settles on his back, either. Arlo is a _brute_ \- and a nasty bully, possibly the nastiest Keith has ever dealt with.

Aside from Arlo’s twin brother, that is. Unlike his brother, Stephan was skinny and frail-looking, but what he lacked in strength he made up in character. He was vicious to a T, and Keith suspects even his own parents are a mite afraid to cross him by accident.  Stephan didn’t just let things go, however little they may be. He’d get his way, or he’d torment everyone standing in it.   
  
Keith often wondered if Haggar and Zarkon didn’t spend so much time working so they could avoid dealing with their demon children. He does the best that he can, too.  
  
“Look at this shit, man, oh- _ohhhh_. No shit you fancy drawin’, orphan?!”

“Not really. Pencils trace lines and brushes paint profiles while I sleep. I judge the result next day.” Keith growls through clenched teeth, what little patience he had wearing thin. “Get off me!”

“Smartass lil' bitch you are.” Arlo emphasises with a heavy stomp, and is proud when Keith coughs. “I’m _so_ fuckin’ moved, look at this. Trees died for you to doodle this crap, oh my god.”

Keith opts to change tack then, and quiet down. He swallows back comeback after comeback for every little hurtful thing he hears, loud, and resonating all the way into his chest even when he knows it’s stupid, even more so when it’s coming from a boy that’s just set on watching him break and snap for good. He knows this, it’s all he thought he’d be leaving behind  two years ago when walking through that ominous creaking mahogany front door and through the arched, rusty fence where the other orphan kids would hang and climb and people-watch. He was the one being watched, at last. Radiant sweet Haggar and her equally dashing husband Zarkon had been there to walk him to their roomy purple car and help him with his very lightweight luggage. He is not sure he recalls a day as happy as that one, sparks of moments so perfect it could well have been a dream. He remembers picking food from a large _menu_ in a place with tables all nicely arranged by a lake, and then eating there, having no rush whatsoever, no chores to do after, only a warmness as foreign in his tongue as in his heart. He was talked to a lot, and even asked, as in the car later _‘Keith! Say, what’d you like to listen to?’_

He was floored by the question, and hearing the sound of his name in someone else’s voice certainly didn’t help quell the feeling. It took him somewhere around three _‘what’s_ and five _‘umm’s_ to put into words the music he liked. In hindsight, he’s surprised they didn’t drive him back to the orphanage when he mumbled _‘that one with, uh…violins it is? And those metallic sounds? It helped me sleep sometimes.’_

Haggar flashed a wide smile back at him though, contagious to the point Keith worried his own stretched lips wouldn’t go back to normal. _“You smart cookie! Classical music it is then. There’s so much to learn about it, it never quite ceases to fascinate me. What a happy coincidence you like it, too! I’m so happy, so, so h-”_

“ _So_ , these all the dudes you sucked off to get out of there, huh? Creepy.” Arlo sneers, flipping the pages of Keith's sketchbook carelessly. “And what’s with this space crap? The NASA logo…The Garrison’s?! Oh, orphie, gimme a break. No one is paying that, _no_ , nope. You’re delusional dude, if you think for a second-“

“Don’t waste your spit. Orphie here is gold panner all right. “

As by telepathy, Stephan walks right in cue from somewhere down the hills. Keith picks up on the smell of earth mixed with heavy sweat as the blond crouches next to him. Grabbing a handful of his hair, Stephan pulls it up hard enough for his scalp to burn. A whisper soon tickles his ear. “ My poor dad wanted a fuckin’ kid, you know. Not a grown-ass, gay, stupid loser. But then you've mom with this diversity bullshit. It’s our duty to help the outcast, yada, yada, yada. He hasn't even got a soulmark, he’s a harmless young soul yada, yada, yada. Well, unlike my mom, I don’t trust you. I don’t fucking trust you around my twin brother, me, or anyone in my family so just fucking kill yourself already. Run away, first, then jump off a cliff with your shitty drawings or whatever. It’s not like _anyone_ alive will fucking care. I bet your own parents would rather you’ve died in the car crash. Bet they would have been fucking _relieved._ ”

“Yes,” Stephan lets him go. “Arlo, give it. And move.” There’s a whine, then a low humming of some tune or other. Keith sits up as soon as the boot leaves his back and tries his best not to groan, shiver, or show any weakness or sign he’s less than unfazed. He sits back hugging his knees and rubs at his calves, feeling sore all over but determined to keep it in, hold his ground or whatever was left of it. They would go away, eventually. And he’d keep drawing. That’s it, simple. It is all right.

His resolution soon shatters, however, when his notebook is tossed back and it lands on his lap. It takes him a few seconds to process it, but his reaction is nothing short of pitiful.  
  
It’s in flames. Burning, all of it. All the sketches he’s done for the past years, gone.  
  
His outburst is short-lived but rampant. _They had no right, this is mine. Mine.  
_

It’s a slip, everything he says then. Everything that gets religiously captured in high-definition videos, for blackmail and humiliation purposes.  
  
_Dumb. You should know better._

He’s left alone, finally, when he’s back on his knees and tears run down cheeks still spotted with bruises. Something akin to helplessness seems to be haunting him lately, and it refuses to be shaken off. It’s like his inner flame had been exposed the moment he believed he could start over again, but instead he swindled himself, or made vulnerable, because now it’s easily put out, now he can’t guard it properly, can’t detach as easily and completely or put up a proper fight.

With a shaky sigh, he clutches at sharp grass and pulls it from the root but it’s half-hearted and it doesn’t come apart, not like his sketchbook did in the fire, no.

Why would it?

 

X

 

“You,” Keith drags his white loofah gently around his soulmark. It sits below his waist, a bubble, on that right angle just above every waistband he wears and it’s a right pain…how he has to use long t-shirts, put a belt over them, then check, check, re-check. “You really don’t know.”  
  
It’s silly, all the things he does for…whom? At best, a _cute_ guy. Well, there are plenty of cute guys around, plenty of people ignoring their soulmarks altogether and dating whoever they please. His said ‘soulmate’ might well be one of them, and even if not, what did he have to offer? Knives, sarcasm? What if it was a girl, anyway? There always was some girl or other crushing on him, both at school and back in the orphanage. It should have been flattering, but it only made him feel sadder, inadequate somehow. Ungrateful for pushing them off, the few people that showed some sort of interest in him and not because they wanted to beat him up.

“I mean, I hope you don’t. Feelings happen, but, uh—I don’t even dwell on them that much. I’m more keen of action. You’re always so calm, though. It feels like a cold breeze blowing on my face when I’m drowning in lava."He takes a deep breath, soapy scent momentarily flooding his lungs. "Maybe that’s what the water filling the bubble is supposed to mean? I swear I saw salt in it sometime…and glitter?!” He taps a finger then traces the pearly outline of the tattoo, smiling in spite of his recent foul mood. “I like to think you just really love taking baths. I’m a shower person myself, it- it can be talked, I guess?”

 _Not like you can answer, ha._  
  
Keith angles his head back into stream of hot water, hoping the cuts that sting now might heal faster and the bruises could stop being so swollen.  Eyes closed, he feels warm. As in comfy-warm, not fury-induced, or horny, or sick. It's exactly the type he recalls getting from hugs, the memories scattered but crystal-clear even as the years pass. A shadow he deems his soulmate holds him close enough in dreams to make the same feeling bloom in him, too. And just like asleep, his imagination readily runs away with him, painting vacation-worthy scenarios where he’s all but drinking out of a coconut while creamy sunscreen is spread on his back by big but soft, so very soft, hands.  
  
_Hands._

They’re like vines around his neck, and when his eyes shot back open, it’s to see Stephan with a lopsided grin. “Little liar, oh how you lie. Lying, lying, never stopping. Thinking you’ll never be, no, not _youuu_ ,” He singsongs, in a strained voice.

Keith doesn’t hesitate to punch him square on the chest. To his surprise, Stephan stumbles back enough for him to get out of the shower. He is quick to grab a towel to tie around his hips and trot back to his bedroom with a sped up heart. He locks the door behind him and plops down in that same spot, back firm against the wood just in case.

“Fuck,” he murmurs under his breath, hands promptly feeling his neck. It throbs all around but it feels okay to the touch. Whole. “He's so creepy.”

 “Orphan! “ A shout comes, perhaps, still from the bathroom. “Congratulations on having a _soul_ -mate.”

“Wha-?” Keith half-gasps, eyeing the half bubble peaking from under the towel he's wrapped in. “No, it's just… tattoos. A tattoo.”

“Aw, cute little bitch you are. I felt your bond when I touched it. Now, let’s cut to the chase, yeah? You have one week to disappear from our lives." He knocks -no, _punches_ \- the door as he speaks. One after every word. "I see you in this house or in school a day longer and I’ll personally sent a DNA sample to the social services to find your little soulmate.”  
  
Keith breath hitches, very acutely feeling his heart is in his mouth.

“And then maybe you’ll know hell. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to see you suffer. I will break you through them, I will make you _repent_ for the disgrace you’ve brought to this house. I’ll wreck you apart just like you did my family." A kick vibrates up Keith's still sensitive back, making him wince."I won’t stop, Keith. You don’t mess with Stephan.”

_No? We’ll see._

“And don’t even bother about picking up your hair or nails, Arlo can always just tackle you and take anything and _everything_ we need. You know this. So, try to use those two neurones for once and _fuckin'_ run. ” A sudden sharp laugh bleeds through the hands Keith had brought to his ears."Wolves will feast on you so nicely, jump right at your neck and then . C _raaaa- **ck** , _ah. Can you hear it, the moment their teeth sink and bend your stupid weak bones all wrong? Huh? That much mercy is above me."

  


X

Top right drawer, under the gloves and bandanas. A false bottom.  
  
He draws the Prussian dagger off the black elastic hoop holding it in place. There’s more, of course, all fourteen that made up the set and are exhibited equally elegantly but the blade in this one in particular is the thinnest, but not the less sharp for it. He’d never found much use for this one before, minute precision hardly being the priority in self-defence counterattacks.

Does he think it through enough?  
  
No, probably not. It’s been hardly half an hour since Stephan left but Keith is as resolute as a religious person practicing their creed. There’s no changing his mind when the only precious thing he’s been allowed to hold close in thought and cherish for years is put in a danger so big so abruptly. It’s not the threats that do it, it’s his own refusal to buckle under them and what it may bring upon them. He wasn’t going anywhere other than the Garrison, and yes, he’d continue to talk it through with his adoptive parents until it became reality.

In space, perhaps, he’d find peace.  
  
In other spheres, that wouldn’t need squinted eyes and a firm pulse. Bleeding, blood, a shy trickling until a sharp tip becomes a blade and what was meant to be skin, sacred, a mere layer to peel off. To come to rest on an ashtray, still tainted with blood, still alive and feeling when a cigarette is pressed into it, and then another and plenty more until it blends with the grey.

Keith looks down at his messy bandage once he’s done chain-smoking away his feelings. His hands were bloody even though he’s just saved a life. He’d never feel whole again, that’s a given, but what he did was good and necessary- no question about it. His soulmate is now free to live a happy, undisturbed life away from all the dangers, troubles and tragedies that seem to plague him. There is no use in pretending anymore, turning the other cheek, trying to keep the nasty at bay, or hoping instead of getting up and accomplishing. He was with himself from now on, and it’d take more than some lousy punches, speeches or impromptu roughhousing to change that.

    
“I’m sorry” He kicks the bedspread away, then the sheets, last the cushions until they land all dumbly on the floor. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t need to hide anymore. Only a pillow, to rest his head, that’s all he needs. He’s not cold, or helpless, not even as he begins to drift off. It’s dark, but he knows. When he spots them one last time, it’s quick and it’s simple.

“I’m sorry, _Lance.”_

 

X

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so ...  
> on a scale of 0 to Nicolas Cage how much do you hate me?? 
> 
> share your thoughts with me if you have the time!! :D
> 
> [tumblr!](https://klancingthecube.tumblr.com/)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so this got LONG....as did the wait i'm seriously so sorry guys i didn't mean to leave you hanging like that uni just got in the way and i had to concentrate on that for a while.  
> but yeah i've been around here binging all the good klance content so i eventually got inspired and back on track :D
> 
> i hope you enjoy how things turned out in the end for these two, i know i did :'''')

Turning around is the worst, after being pulled this way and that into tight hugs, handshakes, impromptu hair-ruffling attacks and just a lot of love from tiny and big people alike.  Waving that one last time and starting to walk up the platform felt a lot like a mistake, each step shaky and unsure, as if getting on the flight headed for the land of dreams, and particularly the Garrison, equalled being sent to war- no, voluntarily going to. It’s ridiculous, of course, he’s somewhat aware of it as he flashes what he hopes is a grin to the flight assistant showing him his seat by the window. He plops down quickly on it, thanks her and hugs his very full backpack, squeezing his eyes shut while trying to remind himself this is what he wanted, what he’d worked so hard towards. It’d been two years of mostly studying, of talking more science with Hunk and Pidge than food recipes or beauty tips or…love, of spending weekend nights in, sat by a telescope and taking notes, of playing more chess with dad than pulling pranks on guileless siblings. It’s only fair he now got to reap, right?

Nobody had made a big deal about it, not even himself. His love of space had quietly filled the void and become a burning priority. Getting into the Garrison had gone from being a dream to a thing to cross off his bucket list, and if half of his personality got swiped off and rebuilt in accord to the changes, then it did.

Sometimes, however, it felt as if it’d moved quietly to the side. Like it lingered, and lingered, the way those hugs would, his sisters’ perfume, the bruises from his younger brother’ mighty you-better-call-us-every-day kicks. The way he family had been there even when he’d got sad and gloomy and quiet enough to fade into their vibrant noise and ways that suddenly grated on him a lot, and so he’d avoid, he’d roll eyes and lock up or run out to where the grass was damp and overgrown and he felt it made sense. Being cold and secluded.

But he’d also never come back to a locked door or exasperated faces. There was always warm food, even though it felt like too much, and there was always more than enough supply of invitations to do things, but never pressure, pats only when he’d nodded and soft knocks on the door after spending hours being locked in his room unbothered.  
  
  
Need anything, Lance?  
  
No, I’m okay ma.

_Great! We’ll be downstairs then._

  
Great and now he was leaving them behind, with no firm promise of ever coming back. He wanted to, it wasn’t like he’d set out to cut ties with anyone ever. It’s not like he didn’t love them, he truly did. He loved. He still loved people, and places, and things that smelled sweet when spread on his skin.  
  
It’d just got caught in his wrist, a lot of it, just lost to the dark.

To a black that draws his gaze in too often, and for too long but it allows no retrieving it, no reliving it. There’s not even a fragment of what it felt like slipping out.

Yet he hopes for the same thing every time he draws his cuff up, and stares.

 

 

X

The first weeks fly by in a blur of movement and repetitive activity. First it’s settling into the dorms, walking in and out of advanced classes and packed cafeterias and toilets, then the quest for getting the mandatory course textbooks and practice booklets and, of course, at every opportunity, being social, cracking up some jokes to hide under and all that jazz . There’s Hunk and Pidge coming over on weekends and sharing their own freshman experiences from last year, and movie marathons and maybe one or two nights of swiftly sneaking all the way up to the roof to play some drinking games until Hunk had to drag a very bad-mouthed Pidge and a somehow comforting, somehow annoying, let-me-tell-you-my-every-kink _filthy_ Lance to their bedrooms.

It seems only a few days have passed when mid-terms arrive. Lance had been warned this would happen, but he isn’t exactly worried either. He’s been keeping up with work more or less, and he understands things fairly well, maybe better than a lot of other kids and maybe he’s proud, so much that it moves him to walk up to the senior’s ranking board and see exactly who he’s up against, or will be, how many near-to-perfect GPA kids he’s currently sharing halls with.

He’s utterly flabbergasted to find _one_ , one boy with a perfect A+ mark leading every class chart. Lance is pretty sure he’s heard lots about (or read in many internet forums, _whatever_ ) how there were no perfect averages at the Garrison, how incredibly lucky you’d be to graduate with a 3.5. He shoots one or five all-caps messages to his group chat with Hunk and Pidge and is not disappointed to see them come running down the hallway he’s in a couple of minutes later.

“What happened?!” Hunk screams, reaching him first and almost tackling him- something he immediately and unnecessarily apologises for. “Lance, are you okay?”

Pidge is on his tail a minute later, complaining about her short legs and gasping something like “Lance this better be urgent. I left Rover alone, you know. My poor robot soulmate that is in _dire_ need of updates and maintenance?!”  
  
“Pidge, that’s not your-”

“This,” Lance slaps Hunk’s arm. “is _the_ urgent _est_ you can think of. So, I was minding my business, just going for a walk when I say, _hey_   let’s check on the seniors you guys will be up against and soon, well, _me_. And look at that! Leading every chart!” He points at the long paper sheets pinned in rows “ How-? Why-? Who is this _Keith Kogane kid with a 4.0 average_? You are geniuses and have what 3.3?! 3.4?”

“The _urgestest_ he said“ Pidge face-palms herself , forgetting about her glasses. “Ow.”

Hunks sags in relief then squints at the name pointed by a long finger.“ Ah, I know the guy. Well, seen him around couple of times. He’s just a rich, I’m too-cool-to-acknowledge anyone kid. Pretty sure his senate parents found the Garrison.”

“Hunk- what the hell?! Please tell me you’re joking. _”_ Pidge face goes from scrunching from pain to scowling as she steps forward and demands Lance’s attention with a snap of her fingers.

“He’s a flawless pilot. We’ve not shared any class so far but I’ve watched many of his flying simulations. Listen, it’s _incredible_ just how good his reflexes are, even under pressure he makes solid decisions every time.” Pidge rearranges her glasses and turns around to cast a disappointed look at Hunk. “Some people are just jealous of him, some others mean because he’s an orphan- so that’d be _adoptive_ parents, Hunk. Anyway, he deserves all those As, rich, poor, or whatever.”

“ Pidge, it’s not just that.” Hunk whines, hands curling in a spark of frustration. “He’s cocky, and unfriendly, and has that way of looking at people like he’s murdering them in his mind.”  
  
She shrugs, eyes narrowing as she scans her friend up and down like she could read through skin, figure out the arrays of 0s and 1s he’s made of so she could reprogram the Fear Emo Kids chip to Let’s Let Lance Be The Judge Of That. “Pretty sure that’s just you.”

  
 “No, it isn’t, okay? I’ve never seen him talk to anyone and he has this mean vibe going on …like, dude, chill! Nobody is shunning him because he’s ‘better’ ” His fingers move to quote air, as if his tone wasn’t telling enough “He’s doing so himself!”

“Again, wrong. He talks to Shiro, I’ve seen him lots.” Pidge deadpans, feeling oddly annoyed at Hunk. “ What’s the deal with being withdrawn, anyway? I didn’t see you saying that about Lance a year ago.”  
  
“The school’s director, Pidge! Takashi! To blackmail the man into giving him a perfect GPA!” Hunk slides a glance to his left and then signals with his hands for Pidge to see “And Lance _is_ friendly.”  
  
“Lance is _your_ friend, you mean.” She cocks an eyebrow in surprise. “He sure looked very unapproachable to strangers just a year ago. We all have our issues. It’s no good going around labelling people you don’t know, Hunk.”

“ _What_ do you know?”

 _“_ What do _you_ know?!”

Lance tries to calm his friends down but it’s hopeless, or maybe he’s still trying to process everything said and taking a side, or maybe he’s just busy feeling guilty for acting this childish again over something so trivial.

Or at least he thinks it's that, until he spots a shadow on the floor right by his and he turns around with a start, thinking someone came to tell them off or shoo them back into their rooms.

It's everything else.

There, standing a mere foot from him, is a carbon copy of his soulmate. Or what little glimpse he’s caught of him. It really can’t be, so he gawks, shamelessly overt. He’s tall, has his arms crossed over his chest and is dressed mostly in shades of black save for a red leather jacket and a wide belt that’s swung diagonally over his hips with neat little pouches attached to it. Then there are the dark bangs that get on his face, covering his forehead and tickling dusty purple eyes wide-open now, directed at him again.

_Again?_

“Are you _Lance_?”

He’d swear it’s the same rasp threading words together, and there’s a burning feeling in his wrist, but it can’t be. No, it’s both fascinating and pathetic his brain would go to such lengths to comfort him, out of all the excesses possible, it’s pure HD escapism he falls prey to, because, yes, he’s well-trapped. He’s _caught_ in this surreal bubble, even with the noise of his friends bickering on in the background, and hell he _knows_ it’s wrong, indulging in whatever this is but Lance can’t find the heart not to. He’s well gone as he steps forward and slips unsure arms under the boy’s armpits, softly, until they give way for him to wrap them properly around his chest. His head follows suit, dropping helplessly on the crook of his neck, sniffy nose catching a fresh fruity scent that’s as familiar as it is comforting. It seems, for a precious moment, _enough._ He’s holding on and not letting go. It works, perhaps, in an alternate reality many planes away. Here, though, all it does is set up his figurative demise as he lets two full-throated wails right there, into the buzzing warmth of the sensitive skin and, gods above, he must be warm all over because Lance feels the scorch all the way to his toes, even if the boy is a bit rigid and slow to move his limbs and hug him back. He’s being held, his brain notes, unable to be other than pleased through the shivering residue and fear, through the easy tears that fall belying how much he’s drowning in his feelings, for the first time in years, and they’re as intense as real, and it lasts, it will last, and tingle on his skin where he’s lightly being stroked on the small of his back, he’s sure of it.

_I’d have hugged you for hours, anytime you wanted. I’d have combed your pretty hair up into a bun in spring, I’d have kissed you stupid every time anyone made you pout. I’d have taken you to bed and made you breakfast in the morning and took you shopping for more black outfits or collection knives. I’d have thrown one in a heartbeat at anyone that came close to hurting you._

He’s sure these thoughts will haunt him plenty, too, even as he wriggles free of the hold and pushes down on shoulders, fake, all of it just a mirage, the tumbling and falling against the wall a nasty brain trick. Lance drags his stare up and ahead before it inevitably fades, sprinting forward and screaming like a wounded animal. He’ll cherish _their_ moment forever, whatever it was, and it’d be worth all the questioning from his friends and hours lost to daydreaming about it. He clutches at his t-shirt as he stops and leans back against on a door clicking shut, registering darkness all around and instantly feeling safe inside the quiet of his room, his gasps but a faint background noise. Padding over to his messy bed he stares, still reeling and in shock, brain half in lockdown, half urging him to search for the best angle to tuck himself into the big tangle of bedspread and sheets…and disappear. He does, and tries, and then goes on to shiver under cotton and sweat helplessly the more he recalls what he’s lost. _How_ he lost it.

“I’m never going to be done being in love with you, am I?”

_I never even got your name._

 

  
  
X

“What did you do to Lance?! He didn’t say anything, it was me! Me! If you touched him, I swear! You’ll _so_ regret it, oh you-you-!” Hunk points at expressionless dark eyes, but they don’t avert his gaze so, fine, he does instead, because there are other priorities, like going after your deeply freaked out friend to check on him.

“Hunk, wait!”

Wait? He trots off in a _hurry_ at the idea Lance might be hurt, stopping only he decides he’s a good distance away- to safely shout back his threat “ You’re so creepy but I will!” 

Small foot stomp on the floor. “Whatever’s up with him today?” Pidge sighs, quickly lowering her gaze to face their very, very recent topic of conversation. “Hey, Keith? Um, sorry about that he’s like… _ultra_ protective of Lance. “What happened anyway ? Are you okay? ”

Pidge waits politely for an answer but Keith seems to be too busy staring into the distance, hand on his mouth and a red tint on his skin showing in what little portion of his face that wasn’t covered by hair of fingers.

_Maybe he is just shy? Very shy…women shy?_

She waves a hand into his line of vision and he seems to jolt back into reality. “I’m Pidge, just a peasant sophomore here. Hello?”

“I’m fine.” Keith swallows, moving his hands up on the wall he’s sat against to give him leverage and help him stand...or something like that. He may be a little dizzy when he does or the floor is swaying left and right, he can’t tell. ”Off to the flying simulator. I was on my way there, actually, when I... I need to practice.”

Pidge quirks an eyebrow at that.

“ You…practice? On a Saturday? Dude, I’ve seen you fly!” Pidge claps in sincere admiration.  “Your level is so far above the simulator’s!”

“No, not even close.”  He whispers under his breath and stills, taking no hint whatsoever of her mild fangirling. Or her, in general.  He rubs at his upper arms with hands that seem dumb with cold but, instead of being subdued, the feeling expands up and outwards from his limbs. “I should go. Good morning, Pi-, uh, to you.”  
  
“Wait! You really don’t look all that good, you know.” She reasons, suddenly worried he hit his head on the metal railing that runs along the wall. He looked lost and moved unsurely around, as if not entirely at ease in his body. “Should I call a nurse?”

“Just tell Lance I’m sorry.” Keith takes a step back and wheels around, eyes glued on the floor so his flimsy balance isn’t compromised. “Thank you.”

Pidge watches the boy limp away and bend in two every few steps, hand closing on his right hip. She follows him in spite of herself, curiosity gnawing away at her brain, something akin to familiarity blooming in her at this whole situation but she still couldn't quite put her finger on it. When they reach the door high-security room that has the simulators inside it’s predictably locked with a passcode and Keith kicks at it in frustration when the one he inputs doesn’t work, mumbling something that has her giggling out loud and blowing her cover.

It’s a curse, he swears. ‘This _fried_ thing’…a curse. Sadly, she doesn’t have time to give him a crash course on the slang of the Cool Kids as she’s quick to find a workaround by overflowing the door control system with fake contradictory requests she sends from her tablet and it does the trick, doors sliding happily open.

“Let me guess, computer science major? ”

“Close, but no. Computer engineering.”

“Oh, cool.” Keith nods, not entirely sure of the difference between the two but figuring it still meant she was a little genius. “Thank you. I won’t be long. It’s just…being in control of a spaceship helps me unwind. Flying, in general.  You should go back to your friend, I guess.”

“ You know that better than me, don’t you?”

“I know _what?_ “

“It’s on your hip, isn’t it? Your soulmark?” Pidge chances, but it’s so clear she internally berates herself for not noticing before. Lance did talk about his soulmate during the first months of his gap year, albeit quietly and on and off, mostly just retelling that one dream this white guy with the plain black clothes and a 'sexy' short red leather jacket. And a _stupid_ mullet.  Keith damn Kogane in a nutshell when not wearing the Garrison's uniform.

“You don’t have to say or explain anything to me, you know. I always told Lance maybe you just messed with it. Glad I’m right and all, you _are_ alive.” Pidge flaps her hands in recognition of Keith in all his emo glory. “Whatever it was I’d rather you didn’t do it again, though. Or want to. Lance is super caring and chill, like, he’s the type of guy that can get along with a wall. Not that you’re a wall, I mean, maybe you see him being loud and think _‘yikes extrovert alert’_ but he’s-it’s a …puppy loud, like…he used to be a lot louder.” She draws her lips tight together, feeling nostalgic about young Lance hung up on pretty much everything his soulmate shared with him. Everything had a meaning, everything could be better. No, he wasn’t exaggerating; he was in a _lot_ of pain. _Now what? Guys, you gotta help me out!_

She agreed: What now?

“Anyway, um, I guess I should be heading back. ”

“Yeah.” Keith nods, stiffly, eyes focused on the simulator for good now. “You go do that.”  
  
“I’ll see you around, right?”  
  
Keith hums back in reply and turns around to avoid breaking down in front of this kid. He really hates thinking he might have his very sudden and real intention to drop out and make a run for it written all over his face already but even if he does, what could she understand? He’s bad luck and bad news and his soulmate deserves infinitely better.  
  
“Keith?”

 

 

X

 

“Where’s that loser?!” Hunk points at Pidge when she tiptoes into Lance’s room. She really wanted to go back to Rover, but the way back up now-populated corridors had seen her tapping a few lines of code to remotely shut him down, definitely not with a final inline comment of how much she loved them and how much surer of their bond she was the more she interacted with real people. Not that they could understand English yet, but the feeling was there, right? Someday her love confessions to technology would stop being comments behind slashes that rude compilers ignore and machines can’t process. Someday Rover would look back and see her genius…and maybe they’d take over one or a hundred galaxies. Or go for a pizza. Or both.

“Pidge? Oh no. He didn’t drug you, dID HE? PIDGE!” Hunk grabs her by the shoulders and she snaps out of it with a long sigh. Trust Hunk to turn overprotective over a guy that had just scurried away with glossy eyes from 5.2 feet her.

And _no,_ she wasn’t being mean.

“Hey, easy. We don’t know anything about what just happened. Don’t go on a manhunt mode just yet.”

“No, no, no. You don’t understand. Lance fell asleep just now. He’s been delirious and feverish, and cold-sweating like it’s all happening again. What is he even doing?! If he’s so against soulmates, or _boy_ soulmates, then at least be upfront about it, man. But no! He’s shady, he’s totally doing this on purpose, Pidge!”

“Hunk, he’s _really_ faring no better.”

“Oh, really? Well, I’m _glad_.”

“Look, I think it’s the soulmarks reuniting their link. I’d done a fair amount of researching back then but the details are probably all jumbled up in my head now.  People with a weak link going into epileptic fits when they first touched their soulmate, I think? Something along those lines. Crazy stuff. These two, though? Think about it. They literally have no link at all as it is, be it whatever it may be Keith did. They got used to living without a connection for two years, and we’ve seen how that looks at one end, okay?” She pauses, pushing back her glasses while deep in thought. “Now try to _very politely_ consider what we knew about Lance’s soulmate before all this. It didn’t sound like someone that had much support or people to fall back on if things got bad, did it? It sounded like someone being hurt a lot to me.”

“I…I don’t know anymore, Pidge” Hunk frown eases a fraction, clearly conflicted, “I’ll give it time until he wakes up. I promised I’d never again sit and watch one of my best friends cry and whir in pain for hours on end. I’ll be _very politely_ dragging Keith here if it comes to it. He either talks or… talks! He’s got two years to make up his mind.”

“No, actually, you’ll stay here” Lance mumbles, rolling off the bed and right onto the floor. “Hunk, don’t,” he holds up his hand and starts crawling towards the bathroom, “I’ll take a **_cold_** shower and go wait for him to be done with those simulations. I’m feeling a little spark of what he feels again, but the black is still all over my wrist. And you know what he seems to be feeling? Guilt. Damn _guilt._ I need to understand why, or like, be near him? ”

“Well, being around each other helps in syncing up to each other’s emotions more acutely and processing them on the spot lessens the strain on your link. Bottom line is, yes, it’ll always feel better when you’re around your soulmate.” Pidge nods in approval of long-gone domestic instincts blooming in Lance.

“Stop egging him on, we don’t know Keith’s intentions” Hunk mutters.

“I’ll _never_ do if you scare him off Hunk.” He faces them with a surprisingly serious expression. “He’s had enough of that. I’ll be fine. This… this may be the finest I’ve ever been, buddy. I really can’t believe it. He’s alive, guys. I’ve a soulmate after all, it’s…” his voice cracks, sudden emotion bleeding into a word carefully picked, “ _unreal_.”

“No, you _not_ having a soulmate was unreal.” Pidge corrects, walking over to open the bathroom door for a slow long slug that snatched some debatably clean boxers in the way, with his teeth. Okay, yes, maybe this wasn’t Lance’s most genius moment but she still figures a dude (some dude? Keith…after a few vodka shots?) might find this sight appealing. “Just try not to overwhelm him. Hunk’s right about him being a bit aloof. You might come on too strong if you don’t watch it.”

“Aloof! Pidge, you make him sound some pure warm sweet crème brûlée forgotten in the back of the fridge, wait, I’m-I’m tearing up, no, okay” Hunk groans, still not that trusting of Keith. “He kicks ass left and right in most if not all close combats practices! He collect knives, and swords...AND I CROSSED HIM FOR YOU LANCE! POint is, you be you, he can more than handle it.”

 “Thanks, guys. I’ll tell you how it went at dinner.” He nudges the door shut with a knee, smile plastered on his face at the new information. Close combat, huh? It’s practical, and a bit old-fashioned and, probably if it’s Keith doing it, _hot_. Like his skin. And the argument about the true nature of Keith that his friends are too engrossed in still when he comes back out, throws on some clean clothes and walks out.

Keith, as in _, his_ soulmate.  
  
For some reason it didn’t sound weird at all.

 

 

 

_X_

_Would you like to go grab coffee?_

_No._

_No?! Oh, what-about-_

_Chocolate. Can it be chocolate?_   
  


Lance almost chocked on his mint. No, scratch that. He’s pretty sure he chocked and never recovered. Keith was…other thing entirely. It’s fair to say the boy was rapidly becoming one of the strangest people he’s ever met. And not in a bad way, just…weird. Dorky weird? It’s too soon to tell, he’s aware, he’s just glad he didn’t openly push him away or booked it in the other direction. Actually, Keith had been… _waiting_ for him, something that might or might not earn Hunk some best bro points because nobody would expect, horror movie actors aside, to see a person standing right behind an opening door, and then tell you:

_Hey. I felt you’d come._

Things took a turn for the good weird soon, though. Once in Lance’s favourite Starbucks, _no they aren’t all the same this one has newer couches come sit by me and see_ , Keith ordered a size _venti_ hot chocolate and bought Lance an equally deadly big coffee of the day, as in pure, tear-inducing black coffee, _because you said you wanted coffee oh and here’s a straw._

He got one for himself too, _(a straw!)_ and Lance is slowly being consumed, the more he watches, by a particularly tender feeling he thought was long gone. His own beverage feels less nasty on his tongue as he sucks idly on plastic and talks less, grows calm, and maybe loses some excess body temperature in the process.

“All right. There’s to feeling my fingers again.” Keith taps his empty cup on the round table. “Chocolate going extinct is why we suck as a society. Cocoa world war is coming, and you don’t see it in the news, no.”

“What?” Lance whips his head to the left, taken a bit aback by the randomness of the comment. He grins at the pouting man. “Oooh, is that a conspiracy or something?”  
  
“Well it wouldn’t be if it wasn’t silenced, obviously. ” Keith mutters in reply. “And it’s not like we’re even close to conquering a chocolate planet.”  
  
“I love chocolate,” Lance says dumbly, brain going back and mulling over just how much it’d looked like Keith had been cold all over while his own skin scorched. Could that be what pulled them to meet? Exactly how bad was it that he still wanted to move closer to Keith, maybe touch him again? See his soulmark, or whatever is left of it?

“My mum would bake me a chocolate cake every weekend if I nagged her enough. But I could always go to Hunk too, you know, my friend, the big huggable one? He cooks gourmet food for a hobby but actually he’s just a Pinterest fiend, I mean,” Lance takes the chance, sliding closer on the coach and throwing an arm casually around Keith, “Between you and me, he learned everything he knows from it, recipes, cooking methods, food presentation. You name it…he’s pinned it.”

“That’s…good.”

There’s no place for awkwardness with Keith.

Half-baked, superficial awkwardness.

The boy stands up and sits on a chair opposite in response to Lance’s approach, leaving him at least with more precious knowledge about the type of person he was paired up to be with, forever.

Brutal.

“Look, I think we started off with a wrong foot here. I feel like I owe you an explanation of what happened.” He gestures with his hands, moving them back and forth, and then in circles when he comes to a pause. Lance thinks it looks like a kitten playing with a spool, and he almost smiles before the meaning of what his very recently retrieved soulmate said starts to sink and he full-body freezes.

“I don’t think I’m ready.” Lance spits out on the spot. “These years have been rough on me. But whatever it was, and I mean _whatever_ , I won’t hold it against you. I’m sure you wouldn’t do anything expecting to harm me.”  
  
“How?” Keith tilts his head to the side, brow gone slightly furrowed. “You can’t know that.”  
  
“I know you. Most of you. Years worth of sharing feelings sort of leave a lasting impression of who your soulmate is in the raw. Now if we’re talking about cocoa wars prognostics, no, Keith, I couldn’t know that. I’m hoping I get the privilege to be informed on all those silenced matters now that we properly met, though.” Lance gaze flits up from his slightly shaky hands pressing into each other to messy hair, dark, and the eyes carefully studying him behind them. “Seriously talking, I’d really rather focus on you being here and alive.”

Keith blinks, amazement taking over his sharp features for a solid minute. “I’m truly sorry. Just know I was hoping I’d protect you that way.”

“That’s…a thing.” Lance nods, chest aching in a way his didn’t, but Keith’s just might.

The tone he used paired with the following silence gave Keith the impression his very own soulmate didn’t believe him. And it’s not like he could exactly blame him. They’d grown close through their bond but they remained so different Keith had never been able to shake the feeling they just weren’t meant to be, that whoever that fragile link bound him to surely deserved better.  
  
“Guess we should move on then to what won’t be happening. I agreed to hanging out on the condition you wouldn’t be looking for more than that. You know how people say things change? Well, for me it doesn’t. A lot of things, the way I see it, don’t change. They are what they are, and will continue to be.”

The last cryptic bits go over Lance's head so he asks, voice shy of a whisper “But…is it…you don’t like guys? “

“N-”

“BE-cause if it’s that, then, please let me remind you I’m not _any_ guy. I’m your soulmate, I-I’ve been with you a- most of my life, I’ve got to know you and care for you and _yes_ , excuse me, maybe I fell in love with you and I want to? I want to very much and it’s really not your place to put restrictions on my love so early on just because you’re stubborn.”  
  
“You’re not listening.” Keith kicks idly at the metal pole the table is fixed on. “Nothing good ever comes out of people getting involved with me.”  
  
“ _You listen_. I get it, you may have lost all hope in people based on lots of crappy experiences, and, like, I feel your pain man, and not just through the bond. I’ve stayed up well in the night many times thinking worst-case scenarios where my family whole died and I was left all alone. I’m really not independent so I guess I’d just die if left like that for long enough but, even if I did manage to sort of go on with my life it’d be a drag.”

“We…we aren’t meant to be alone, and, I don’t know , I’ve always figured soulmarks heighten that nurturing feeling in all of us. Or at least in those not mocking it or ‘ignoring it’” Lance quotes, feelings overflowing. “As if! You fell heavy on your back and I get all restless imagining what happened. Not knowing the details, that’s rough. You’d see me trotting down the stairs back at school then freezing wondering maybe if it was it, or maybe you passed out, or…someone hurt you.”

“I had no way of knowing for sure, and you had no idea the effect it had on me, maybe only some worry that got in the bond but like, god, you can’t just…tell me to get lost now or whatever.  You may not be in love with me. That’s okay! Let me win you over, and woo you, and make you see me less than a scary loud bi _guy_ and more like a person. Your soulmate?  ”

Keith takes a deep breath, double checking Lance hadn’t magically started babbling about things way too sentimental again. “As _I was_ saying: _No_ , I’m gay. You could’ve saved saying all that … _stuff_   if you just, uh, calm down?”

“I can’t calm down if you’re trying to re-sever our already severed bond!  So, great, you not only dig dudes but you _only_ dig dudes. So!” Lance throws his arms open in exasperation and points at his chest, where buttons had been popped open for seduction purposes alone. “Dude. Dashing. Right in front of you. I’m not seeing the problem!  I mean, yes, relationships but, hell, we’re different parts of the same…thingl! You don’t _get involved_  with your hair because you comb it. “

“I don’t, really.”

“What?!”

“Comb my hair.”

“Then I will, okay?! Mullet and all.”

Keith burst in a sudden laugh at the boy’s misunderstanding of almost every few words he uttered, but for once he didn't mind it. That, and his frowny, very cute face. It was the first time he saw someone being so all over the place trying to earn his favour. It was unusual, but even he could see the sincerity oozing from the boy, just like that breezy feeling that'd so many times enveloped him slightly in the spur of his rage, pulled him back from the brink of making stupid decisions time and time again. Wasn’t it egotist to draw someone so…cheery into his less-than-rosy world? Wouldn’t he be spoilt by it?

But then again, soulmates. The soulmark slowly re-appearing on his hip was the on-skin mark of his link to this boy, the same he’d touch, talk to and hope to never fade even when his heart paired with logic and his feelings went down the drain. He’d experienced a void so utter since, it seems wrong to now cave in to a pull so clear, to look right into light-blue eyes and first-hand experience that calm he felt so familiar already, so his. It’s not the way their bodies and souls are wired to work, though. It becomes clear little by little, as the daze begins to wear off, and a soft longing settles.  
  
_If there’s no hope for soulmates, then there’s hope for no one._  
  
He takes in a deep breath and exhales silently. His voice still comes out too thin.  “Okay. You’re good at that.”

“Combing hair? Oh!” Lance perks up in incrments, the long pause having set him a little on edge. “I think have a comb on me somewhere.”

“No. Being loud, I guess. You always make me laugh at random. People stared when I was a kid.” He shrugs, seeing Lance’s smile slowly widen. “I said my imaginary clown friend told me a joke and I couldn’t remember but it was great. I’d wake up like that sometimes…”

“ _Woah,_ okay. Gotta thank my little devil siblings for pulling pranks on me every morning.” Lance puts down the three combs he’d taken out of different pockets and finds it hard not to dawn on just how warm his cheeks feel, it’d been too long.  “Okay, that’s something!”

“And you can comb my hair if you want. Yours looks nice.”

“OKAY!” He stands up, fishing some stray clips out of his jeans. “I’ll have you know I'm a pretty fine self-taught hairdresser, you really don’t know what you are getting into!”

But, for once, Keith though he did. It was clear as the bubble tingling back to life in his hip, feeling half-foreign warming up his insides as he tilted his head back to spot an inverted Lance that chuckled easily and softly pushed his neck forward.  
  
“You just…stay how you were. It’s fine.”

“I’ll try.” Keith sighs, messy emotions coming forth at the feeling of someone else’s hands touching him with care, just for the sake of it and nothing else.“ I …always tried.”

“I know,” Lance plants a kiss on his crown on a whim, sensing a twirling sadness well up in his eyelids, unbidden by himself. “And I’ll help. And I’ll cry with you, and comb your pretty hair until you smile and tell me why on earth you drink hot beverages out of straws. And maybe I’ll kiss you.”  
  
“Until I stop pouting?” Keith whispers, almost a singsong that has Lance turning several shades of red in an instant. Hadn’t he…thought that?

“Yes, I mean, if you want me to. Anytime.” Lance puts some clips into place and, voíla, look at that messy bun, he’s been officially dethroned of his hottest-guy-on-campus title. Keith immediately ducks his head when Lance stops holding him so he’s careful, going to sit back at his spot across him and watching Keith in silence. A shaking of shoulders warns Lance but he decides to wait it out, afraid he’s overwhelmed the boy but also understanding he may just need space and that a coffee shop and a lingering lance might not be cutting it.

“Keith, uh, wanna go somewhere else or…you need some time alone? “ Lance stretches out a hand in offer. “I can walk you back to your dorm?”  
  
“Walk _me?_   No. No, it’s nice here.” Keith head shots up without warning and his eyes, bright with tears, take Lance aback for how beautiful they look and when their gazes meet it’s he who has to look away, ashamed, guilty and intimidated all at once.  “Mind if I smoke?”  
  
“No, go on.” Lance says to the floor, still feeling that tickle of being looked at intensely. Or maybe he’s just not done blushing, and feeling mushy. Soft? As in, tear-jerked cheeks soft. How the hell did that mix came over him so soon?

“I think my soulmark is done healing.” Keith drops, casually stroking his lighter to life.  
  
“What?!” Lance pulls back his sweater cuff and sure enough, there’s a baby little rose, full with thorns but looking fresh and thriving. On his skin, no black or shadows or numbness. He runs his thumb tentatively over it and feels a jolt of sadness laced with pain. He wishes he knew more to them, but having Keith there, at arm’s length, calms him considerably.

“Okay,” Lance smiles coyly at Keith. “Feels nice.”

“Me? It feels nice for _me_ to have your ever airy feelings overriding mine.” Keith crackles dryly and blows out strings of smoke that linger in the air around them, as if knowing weekends are a free pass for smoking, drinking and pretty much doing whatever they please as long they’d be good and ready by Monday.  
  
“I’m not going anywhere, even if it never does, all that.” Lance has a flashback to his dream and his promise. “It’s fine. It’s just a feeling after all, it’s not you. I promised you once in a dream I’d help you get through this, and I stand by it, okay? Don’t go straining to become some nonchalant bubble now because you’re scared you’re bothering me or whatever. Man, I hated it when you did that. And you bet I still do! I’ll give you crash course on basic sharing-of -feelings etiquette for soulmates if I have to, Keith. You’ll feel better the less you bottle up. ”  
  
“It feels safer my way, though.”  
  
“Then we’ll work until it doesn’t. We won’t be able to keep anything from one another at one point and yes it sounds scary to me too, hell, but we’re in this together and it’s only natural we become closer and feel better the more tuned in we are, okay?” Lance slides a hand on the table to reach out for Keith’s. “Naughty _and_ embarrassing stuff included... like me still _occasionally_ watching Dora the explorer and laughing to it. Okay, there it is. The world didn’t end and you’re _so_ judging me oh my god is that a smile?!”

Keith bites his lip, trying to conceal what Lance had already spotted. “You’re everything I pictured you’d be… and _more_.”  
  
“You’re so giggling!” Lance points at him and gasps in mock offence when his hand is swatted away in a playful manner.  “Is that bad? I feel pretty much the same way about you.”  
  
“Nah.”

“Then we agree! I mean, as long as you don’t go all mister Mc-Knifey on me during sex.”  
  
“I… _no_. What the hell, Lance?!”  
  
“Good, we’re on the same page.” He winks, bringing up two finger guns in his signature cool gesture. Keith loses no time shaking his head, bun coming undone slowly and tickling him enough to huff-giggle.

 _It looks like you haven’t laughed in ages. Same with me keeping a strict ban on jokes, flirting and everything silly that didn’t make sense anymore. Watching you like this makes it seem we’ve been living in pause all along, you know? You stole away the play button and I just launched myself at it the moment you took it out and now we laugh and I joke and I want to kiss you very badly the more you blush._  
  
Lance feels a rush of sharp affection at the thought, or the image, or Keith, or everything and nothing all at once. And then his gaze is drawn down by a glow, reddish, that turns out to be a petal blooming open and slowly painting the back of his wrist.

Maybe better wasn’t that far away all the time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for all the support in the form of kudos and/or comments, you're all so lovely I swear it makes my day to see you guys like reading this as much as i did writing it

**Author's Note:**

> *minor edits have been made, in case you're re-reading  
> dealt w/ typos, re-phrased some bits, you know...
> 
> share your thoughts with me in the comments if you have time!!
> 
> hope u have/had a good day! thanks for reading ♥\ (•◡•) /
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr!](https://klancingthecube.tumblr.com/)


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